Chisoxfn

Apprently this was the price on Boldin and must have been why Angelo wasn't able to get something worked out. They were probably demanding our 2nd this year, 2nd next year and more.

QUOTE (Steff @ May 14, 2009 -> 01:30 PM) Bri's been going since she was 5 months old and not being able to get around on her own was a big plus. Getting her into the routine that young has also helped now that she can get around. Now she just sits or stands on my lap clapping and yelling "White Soxxxxx". We've started potty training so sometimes she wants to go try, but as long as I have enough snacks and her juice she's great. Awesome. Mom of the year!!!! I hope my kids first words are White Sox. Everything going good Steff? Its been too long.

Is that a famous chick?

QUOTE (Kalapse @ May 14, 2009 -> 01:27 PM) That would require offering those 3 players arbitration, something that will not be happening. (Dye is the only one that's even remotely possible) Even in that case I think the Sox would be better off to negotiate a deal with him and by all means I wouldn't be opposed to bringing Dye back on a 2yr 12-14M deal with incentives as our DH (key word being as our DH). He could ocassionally play in the field but primarily would be the DH.

QUOTE (GreatScott82 @ May 14, 2009 -> 01:22 PM) Good post. There almost better off just letting Dye, Thome and Contreras walk at the end of the year and just use the type a or b compensation when they leave via free agency. The problem is you'd have to offer those guys arbitration and given the economy they might accept. That is why I think you'll see very few players kept this deadline where as in the past you would keep the player if you didn't get a fair offer cause you'd figure you'd get compensation. Case in point, you offer Dye arbitration and he's going to get 12-13M guaranteed and if he went out on the open market I don't know if he gets a deal that gives him that much. I think he might get a 2-3 year deal at 8 million per if he was really really lucky but wouldn't be shocked to see him get only something like a 3yr 18M deal.

Like it or not, Lillibridge is gonna be in Charlotte.

Baseball America had a recent write-up on him (see link below) as a guy that is flying up the draft boards and is now widely regarded as a top 5 round selection, although if you look through the blogs and get various quotes from scouts, it seems very plausible that he could go as late as the 10th round. Scouts describe him as a "tools shed" and he's a guy I would bet money on the Sox targeting with one of there selections. He didn't start initially this year for his Miama Dade JC squad but has since exploded onto the scene with 10hr's in 99 at bats. The guy has massive power potential, a great frame, andone hell of an arm (average to a little above average speed). He's currently 6-5 210 and considered one of the premiere athletes in the draft, however, he's incredibly raw as he's originally from the Virgin Islands and has not played a ton of organized baseball. He missed the 2008 baseball season due to being academically ineligible at Alcorn State and according to baseball america his best skill set is his 70 arm (out of 80 on the scout scale). Oh and I had mentioned that Blash would be a pretty good lock as a guy the Sox looked at and thats because they had previously targeted and drafted him two years ago out of high school in the 29th round of the draft. Below is an interesting quote: Baseball America article about him: http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/draft...009/268094.html

I thought you were going to suggest putting a package together for Peavy surrounded by Alexei Ramirez, haha. And no, I'm not suggesting that the Pads would accept that deal.

QUOTE (southsideirish71 @ May 14, 2009 -> 11:54 AM) To get anything decent we would have to eat some of the remaining contract. And that is something that we don't do. In this case that won't be the case since most of the contracts that the SOx will be moving will be ending at the end of the year so it shouldn't be a big deal, imo. The Sox won't be getting any superstar #1 prospects in return though or at least I don't believe they will.

From Baseball Amercia:

QUOTE (IowaSoxFan @ May 11, 2009 -> 09:08 AM) Would Donovan Tate still be around when the Sox pick? I think he would be a great pick in the supplemental round as there is a lot of risk involved with him not signing. He supposedly has five legitimate tools, but I dont know much about him other than he is a two sport athlete committed to UNC for baseball and football. Nevermind, just read that he is a Boras client as well... Per Baseball America

From Baseball America:

Per Baseball America:

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ May 14, 2009 -> 11:03 AM) Swisher still has a 147 ops+ this year, so he's due to come back a little, hell probably end up around his career numbers, which are that of a good player, especially with his OBP and his ability to take a ton of pitches, something this lineup lacks. Yeah, it's hard to say what the ultimate effect of the hitting coach is, I just hate the approach of many of our hitters the last few years and I'm scapegoating Walker. Look, you're going to get a chance for your argument to be right because Walker is going nowhere, so we'll just have to agree to disagree and as a Sox fan, I hope you're right. (Edit: God, my spelling and simple grammar is even worse than it normally is today!) If I see Getz turn into a dead pull hitter than I'll shut up forever on Walker. But AJ still does his thing, pretty similar to how hes' been his entire career. I'd say he's been a bit better at times and abit worse at other times but he does drive the ball more than he did with other teams. Dye has been similar throughout his career and is not a pull hitter. Thome always has been and as he's gotten older he's bound to become more of one (most pure power hitters turn more and more into pull hitters late in there careers because they tend to have to cheat to some extend to still be successful; see Frank Thomas). Konerko has also been a guy that tends to pull the ball, but still uses all fields pretty well (but his power is and always will be to Left and Left Center). I'd say the exact same thing with Joe Crede (being a primary pull hitter). So as a hole, I think the reason you see this about the Sox is they tend to have had a lot of sluggers and teams with lots of sluggers tend to be a bit more pull happy by nature. The Sox just haven't had many good "pure" hitters on this squad so we think that its the approach but really its more in line with the type of hitter the guys are for the most part, imo.

QUOTE (3E8 @ May 14, 2009 -> 10:53 AM) I searched pitch type and plate discipline on FanGraphs for all players with at least 100 PAs. Only Getz sees a higher percentage of fastballs than Fields (and it's less than 1% more) in terms of White Sox players. This is because Josh Fields cannot hit a fastball. If you were to only look at the percentage of fastballs for "power hitters", Fields would be near the top of this list. Fields is 4th worst in either league in terms of how often he makes contact with pitches which are in the strike zone. Fields only makes contact with 72% of pitches in the strike zone (this is quite low for a major league hitter), the next lowest on the White Sox is Jim Thome at 80%. Keep in mind Thome sees much fewer fastballs than Fields does. Fields' lack of contact is due to all the extra movement in his hands before the swing, his hitch. The hitch decreases his bat control and makes hitting fastballs belt-high or above more difficult. I expect pitchers to expoit this weakness more and more until Josh makes some kind of adjustment Excellent post.

QUOTE (kane0730 @ May 14, 2009 -> 10:54 AM) Probably can add Dotel to the list. Maybe Linebrink. Obviously both are very valuable to the Sox, but if you can get good prospects for them and free up the salary I wouldn't be opposed to it. That said, they both make a decent chunk of money so I don't know if teams would give the Sox much anything for them. Plus I am a firm believer that in this economy the Sox could go out and find other relievers that would do a similar job.

QUOTE (kyyle23 @ May 14, 2009 -> 10:54 AM) Is that Williams Twins thing EVER going to get resolved? Supposed to come down today. I hope they get that 4 game suspension, but I wouldn't be shocked if they didn't.

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ May 14, 2009 -> 10:52 AM) well with a few guys in the minors now and see what they draft in June he'll certainly have his chance. We'll see. To me the team is too pitchable to still. The Harrisson (sp?) guy from the Rangers was not pitching as well as his results IMO, they were still trying to pull everything from what I saw, they had some bad ABs against him that are indicitive of struggles they often have, vets included. I'm a big believer in never confusing the amount of work with results... Is he as bad as I or other make him out to be on the board? Probably not, no. I understand he's given specific players with specific skill sets. My main gripe with the offense of this team is that they're pull happy and they seemingly make adjustments to certain types of pitchers. Borchard, Anderson and Fields were high picks, and so far they've gotten very little to nothing from them at the plate outside Fields first extended stint, and i haven't seen that hitter this year. Those are big indictments to me of Walker, as is Swisher. He had an OPS+ of over 120 his last to years with the A's, comes here has an OPS in the low 90's and then with the NYY is above his career average. Maybe the problem isn't Swisher wouldn't listen, but Walker is bad at communicating his ideas Walker had pretty little to do with Borchard. In terms of the other high picks, lets look at the organizations track record when it comes to first round picks the last 10 or so years. It's pretty much pathetic. In terms of Swishers poor production, I believe he's been slumping as of late in New York but I would be the first to admit that if you wanted to point blame at walker stinking, Swisher would be the guy I'd use as bait as he had a solid major league career prior to coming to the Sox where he absolutely was f***ing terrible.

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ May 14, 2009 -> 09:47 AM) That's kind of my feeling on this season so far too. I've been pretty level during the horrendous play because this division is pretty average and if this team could get their head out of their asses they'll be in it all summer. The one thing that worries me is it's the same old offensive approach and Walker still just sitting on the bench with apparently no job responsabilities. It's scary to see how long Fields swing has become and seemingly no adjustments. Simple scouting report on the Sox must be throw any garbage over for 1st pitch and you'll get ahead, then if you have two strikes throw it away from them and they'll flail at anyting. Also, if you fall behind and it's a hitters count, don't throw them anything to hit because they're not selective and will swing because it's a hitters count. From what I've always been told and consistent with what I've read in the paper and heard on the radio, Walker is one of the hardest working batting coaches in all of baseball. He puts in hour after hour personally with the players and does his job. You have to remember that its been a long time since the Sox called up a big time hitting prospect (and no, Josh Fields, is not a big time hitting prospect). Ie, a consensus top 25 prospect in all of baseball. Really, if you look at the Sox, Joe Borchard was the last consensus top offensive prospect that they called up and everyone knew his swing had some adjustments to be made. Anderson was a highly rated prospect as well, who had a long swing and was rated where he was based upon pure potential and well the Sox have really worked hard on him and it shows (his swing is better, but its still not there). Crede and Rowand were the last two solid prospects the club had and Walker did good things with both of them. Quentin didn't come through the system but you have to give Walker some sort of credit as Quentin had his best season (he was also healthy until punchin the bat which helped) in the majors. Walker worked hard with Ramirez last year and it paid off too and he's working hard with him again and it seems like just recently things might have been fixed. Swisher didn't really listen as the Sox had evidently identified exactly what was wrong or at least thats what was always reported. Konerko, Dye, Thome have all been relatively fine with Walker. Konerko's struggles last year were due to health. Thome is getting older so we should expect to see his numbers decline a bit and Dye has been steady. I have no problem handing over our next crop of players to Mr. Walker.

Glad to see the captain comes out and states the facts. Hopefully the team gets its lineup back and wakes up. If not, we'll see at least a few familiar faces dealt at the deadline (Dye/Thome/Colon).

QUOTE (MHizzle85 @ May 14, 2009 -> 09:06 AM) It's the one about soccer actually. And it has Elijah Wood and is badass.

QUOTE (BearSox @ May 14, 2009 -> 05:49 AM) I got 7 of 10 as well. The one about how many ways a player can reach 1B was complete BS anyway, as some of the rules aren't even enforced. I f***ed up on the one about the player standing on 1B getting hit in the leg. After I clicked the wrong answer, I immediately released how stupid I was. And for the last one about ERA, how the hell did they get 4.76? ERA = (Earned Runs X 9) divided by (Total Innings Pitched) It says that the pitcher gave up 2 runs in the first five innings (doesn't specify if they are earned or not though). Then it says the in the sixth (again, doesn't really specify if it's the sixth inning, or going into the pitchers sixth inning of work), it says he puts the first two runners on, gets the next two outs, and then is taken out for a relief pitcher who gives up a hit scoring one run, but then gets out of the inning. Am I stupid, or is the final line on the pitcher 5.2 IP, and at least 1 ER (could be 3 ER, but they didn't specify in the first) given up? How in hell is the ERA than 4.76? 5/2/3 innings with 3 runs given up. If he had given up 3 runs in 6 innings it would have been a 4.5 ERA, so in this case he had a little less, thus if you do the math, his ERA was actually 4.76.

QUOTE (daa84 @ May 14, 2009 -> 05:47 AM) i got 8 of 10....i missed the stupid how many ways to get to 1st base one....and "A runner is on first with no outs. The batter hits a line drive that accidentally hits the runner, still standing on first, in the leg. The ball rolls to the first-baseman, who tags the bag. What’s the call?"......i should have known that one though Those are the same two I missed. I had no idea on the amount of ways you can get to 1st base and than on the other one I still think I'm right but apparently I was wrong.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ May 14, 2009 -> 05:16 AM) Ozzie has been telling Lillibridge he needs to cut his swing down for weeks. He hasn't done it. Maybe when they show Walker the door, Ozzie should be right behind. I'm being sarcastic, but I think way too many people here think the correct hitting coach can make everyone a .330 hitter. Lillibridge hasn't hit anywhere the past 2-3 years, Fields and Anderson have always had long swings.

I hope regardless the Sox give him about 2 or 3 starts and let him just pitch and figure stuff out.